GRAY – The countdown is on. The magic number for the Gray-New Gloucester softball team is down to six.

“Now we have six games left to win,” said Patriots coach John Moody. “We only have two regular season games left and the playoffs. That’s been our goal all along.”

The defending Class B state champs began the count at 10 – six regular season games and four playoff wins before a state title.

“We really want to go out with a bang,” said third baseman Cait Mason. “It would be nice to go (to states) three out of four years.”

The nucleus of the Patriots has had an abundance of success. Four seniors – Mason, Kelly Bregman, Dawn Ross and Emily Baker – were part of the state championship team as freshmen. Another senior, Katie Skilling, was part of last year’s championship.

“Once you have one state championship, you don’t go into the next year not wanting another one,” said Baker, the catcher. “We’ve got two in softball. We came pretty close in basketball. We didn’t quite make it. It’s just a great feeling to be out there on the field, and you realize that you can’t get any better. You’ve done the best you can and gotten that far.”

It is the way these seniors would like to go out. They went so far as to uphold tradition, or superstition, to start the season off right. Their freshmen and junior seasons the Patriots went to Florida and won the state title the same year.

“Every time we go down, we win a state championship and the one time we haven’t, we lost,” said Moody explaining why the team altered the plan to go every two years. “That’s about it. It was supposed to be every other year.”

One goal the squad had was a perfect season. That ended with an early season loss to their rivals from Greely. So now one last run is left for the Patriots (13-1).

“We’ve been there before,” said Baker. “So we want it that much more.”

The Patriots and Moody hope it is a long last few weeks. The core of the team has been together for years and have shared a wealth of experiences.

“For the people that have been together, it’s really special for us,” said Mason. “We know it’s coming to an end. We’re just taking it for all it is. We’re really excited.”

Mason says it hasn’t really hit her yet that it is almost over. Moody says the team hasn’t talked about it and likely won’t. They’re staying focused on the final six games.

“I’ve had three of them for eight seasons,” said Moody, who is also the girls’ soccer coach. “Four of them, I’ve had for six seasons. So it’s hard (to see them leave). As a group, this will be tough.”